The Kryptonian Defense
by asad.jaleel
Summary: Batman and Superman play a game of chess.


The Kryptonian Defense

It's 1 a.m. in the Justice League Space Station. Batman and Superman are alone together. Superman spies a ratty plastic chess set in a cardboard box.

S: Hey Bruce, how about a friendly game of chess?

B: I can't I've got recon data to study.

S: You've had that data for 3 weeks and you haven't read past the first line. C'mon. Superman vs. Batman.

B: I'm not a nice person when I compete.

S: Think I can handle you. After all these years, I know a little bit about you.

B: You don't have some superpower that lets you calculate millions of moves, do you?

S: Nope. All I got between the ears came from Ma, Pa, and the Smallville Public School system.

As he confidently placed one of his bishops, Bruce said, "Y'know Smallville, there's one thing I never got about you?"

"Yeah?"

"Why didn't it break you? I mean, when you learned the truth about Krypton. When you learned that your planet, your civilization, your species, your parents – all were gone. Why didn't that break you?"

"Perspective."

"Huh? What is that supposed to mean?"

"I had Ma and Pa. I had Smallville. Learning the truth about Krypton didn't take any of that away. All it meant was that I had everything I had in Smallville, plus something else. I had all that plus another set of parents that had cared about me. Why would that make me sad?"

Having lost his queen and seeing Clark's in relative safety, Bruce felt a twinge of something alien to him. Poverty. His mind started wandering. He started to imagine an actual queen, a green-skinned monarch of some distant planet. He saw himself trying to embrace her and then saw her slipping through his hands like a ghost. Considering his own checkered past with women –Talia, Zatarra, Selina, how appropriate that he should lose that crucial feminine piece.

"Bruce, Earth to Bruce, Come in Bruce."

"Sorry, I was thinking about something else."

"I'll say. Seems like something much more important than chess is on your mind."

A few minutes later, it was the Man of Steel who seemed to have checked out.

"Clark. It's your turn!"

"Sorry Bruce. Just thinking about something. Actually I wanted to ask you something."

"Shoot."

"Why don't you just kill the Joker?"

Bruce was stunned. "You above all should know. We can't kill."

"Soo, you've never killed anyone?"

"That's a negative." Bruce was getting irritated.

"Have you ever sent a guy to the hospital with some broken ribs?"

"Sure, goes with the territory. Kal-El, you know all this already."

"Hear me out. So do those rib guys always get better?"

"Maybe. Maybe not."

"You're okay with roughing up a two-bit crook to the point that he might die, but you won't affirmatively kill a dangerous psychopath whose history shows him to be untreatable?"

"I'm not trying to be the Dalai Lama. I'm no saint. But I have to live with myself." The Bat placed a rook almost reflexively and the Kryptonian gobbled it up with a bishop. He had never seen him practice such artful deception.

Endgame. Bruce thought this phase of the game would favor him. Anyone could get a decent opening by studying a book or two. Then in the midgame, Clark's sense of fantasy could guide him to more inventive moves than he might see. But the endgame was all about cold calculation and going for the kill.

Clark knew the endgame would be a struggle, even though he had been playing well, especially considering the strength of his opponent. For one thing, he was enjoying the diversion and didn't want it to end. For another point, he was down to just a bishop and a pawn. He felt much more comfortable when he had a large, diverse force at his command. He hated the kind of trench warfare where one had to strike quickly, then retreat to safety. Also, he knew that Batman was at his best when he was outnumbered.

EE-OO! EE-OO! EE-OO! That siren signaled a major threat to the safety of the galaxy. Superman and Batman had precisely 100 seconds to respond. As they dropped their pieces, Bruce spotted a series of three moves that would lead to a checkmate before Earth's bravest Boy Scout would ever see it. But when Clark said, "I guess it's a draw," Bruce nodded. Winning in his head was enough.


End file.
